How the U.S. Is Interrogating a Qaeda Suspect

The United States seized a leader of Al Qaeda — Nazih Abdul-Hamed al-Ruqai, better known as Abu Anas al-Libi — outside his three-story house in Tripoli, Libya, on Saturday and is reportedly interrogating him in the brig of the Navy ship the San Antonio, in the Mediterranean Sea. The following covers some basic questions about his interrogation.

Q. Who is conducting it?

A. The interrogation is almost certainly being conducted by a high-value interrogation group, which includes members from various government agencies. The F.B.I. leads the group, with help from specialists from other agencies like the C.I.A., the State Department and the Defense Intelligence Agency. The groups were conceived in 2009 as part of President Obama’s revisions to the interrogation policies that he inherited from President George W. Bush. Such panels are made up of regional specialists with expertise in the language, culture and background of the suspect, and they may be assisted by agents and analysts who were already tracking him.

Q.What techniques may they use?

A. Under an executive order issued by Mr. Obama in 2009, they must obey the restrictions of the Army Field Manual, which was written to comply with the Geneva Conventions and forbids torture and lesser forms of cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment. The manual largely permits a variety of “rapport building” techniques, including direct questioning, the “good cop, bad cop” routine, tricking a detainee into revealing more information, inducing him to brag about his exploits, appealing to his emotions or threatening him with severe legal consequences (though threats of torture are not allowed) and offering incentives for cooperation. It requires that a detainee receive at least four hours of continuous sleep every 24 hours.

A. Probably not. This is an intelligence interrogation, not a criminal interrogation. Mr. Ruqai almost certainly has not been warned of any Miranda rights to remain silent or to have a lawyer present. Given the inherently coercive context of the interrogation, prosecutors would face a steep challenge in convincing a court that any self-incriminating statements made by the detainee were freely given.

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Nazih Abdul-Hamed al-Ruqai, who is also known as Abu Anas al-Libi.

Q.Does the interrogation raise any legal issues?

A. Possibly. Mr. Ruqai is being detained as a combatant under the international laws of war, as triggered by the 2001 Congressional authorization to use force against Al Qaeda and its allies. Article 22 of the Third Geneva Convention, which governs the treatment of prisoners of war, says they “may be interned only on premises located on land and affording every guarantee of hygiene and healthfulness.” A 1960 International Committee of the Red Cross “commentary” on this article — a kind of explanatory gloss — suggested that the concern was housing on “boats, rafts, or ‘pontoons,’ ” which it says is “absolutely forbidden.” The legal questions include: Does Article 22 apply to Mr. Ruqai, and does the article prohibit a period of several weeks in the brig of a large Navy ship?

Q.Why did the United States put him on a ship?

A. The Obama administration lacks a clear place to house newly captured Qaeda detainees for intelligence interrogations. It still wants to close the prison at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba; though Congress has blocked it from doing so, the administration has held the line at adding any new detainees there. For a time, the United States brought some detainees to the prison at Bagram Air Base, in Afghanistan, but it has now largely transferred that facility to the control of the Afghan government, which does not want to deal with detainees from elsewhere. Were Mr. Ruqai to be brought to a military base on land somewhere, it could raise legal issues with the host government, and were he to be brought onto United States soil, he could arguably have an immediate right to a lawyer. Holding him — and possibly transporting him — on an American vessel in international waters avoids potential diplomatic and legal headaches.

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A. If the Obama administration follows the model it set in 2011 in the case of a Somali man, Ahmed Abdulkadir Warsame, after the intelligence interrogation is finished, it will give Mr. Ruqai a break of several days, allow the Red Cross to visit him and send in a “clean team” of fresh F.B.I. interrogators who have not been briefed on what he said to the interrogation group. The new team will read him a Miranda warning, including whether he waives his right to be questioned with a lawyer present, then ask him a new round of questions intended to gather evidence that could more clearly be used against him in court.

Mr. Ruqai is likely to be transferred to the Southern District of New York, where he has been indicted on conspiracy charges stemming from the 1998 embassy bombings in Africa. The same court was used for several other defendants in that conspiracy. Mr. Ruqai’s case is part of the same series of indictments on which the government prosecuted Ahmed Khalfan Ghailani, the first Guantánamo detainee to be tried in the federal system, and on which two others suspected of being Qaeda operatives were extradited from Britain last year and are now facing trial.

Q.How did the Warsame case play out?

A. Mr. Warsame is described by the government as a former military commander with the Shabab in Somalia, the group that carried out the recent attack on a Nairobi shopping mall. He also acted as a liaison with Al Qaeda’s branch in Yemen, the authorities say, and was captured by the United States in the Gulf of Aden in April 2011. The government has said that he was questioned aboard a Navy ship for intelligence purposes for about two months, without being advised of his Miranda rights or given a lawyer. After a break of four days, the authorities say, he was advised of his rights, waived them and then spoke for about seven days to law enforcement agents. Prosecutors have said that he waived his Miranda rights at the start of each day during that questioning.

Q.Was the information he provided useful?

A. There is little question why the authorities see the Warsame case as a model. After his shipboard interrogations, he was brought to Manhattan and arraigned in federal court in July 2011; five months later, he entered a secret guilty plea and became a cooperating witness. He then met weekly, for hours at a time, with the authorities, disclosing what he knew and being available to testify as a prosecution witness against another Shabab defendant charged in Manhattan, a step that became unnecessary when the defendant pleaded guilty. In March, when Mr. Warsame’s plea deal was unsealed in court, Preet Bharara, the United States attorney for the Southern District of New York, said the case had provided “an intelligence watershed.”

Q.Why was he so cooperative?

A. It is not known what motivated Mr. Warsame to cooperate, but his situation may be similar to those who have cooperated in more classic cases involving organized crime or white-collar crime: they see it as their only route to avoiding a long prison sentence. Although Mr. Warsame pleaded guilty to a nine-count indictment and could be sentenced to life in prison, he will almost certainly be the beneficiary of a letter from prosecutors to the judge recommending leniency when he is sentenced if he continues to cooperate with the government. He could also be recommended for the witness protection program. Prosecutors have also said in court papers that they kept Mr. Warsame’s plea secret at first because unveiling it would have made it harder for the government to investigate and prosecute his associates, and it would also “pose a threat to the safety of his family abroad.” So, cooperating with the government may also enable him to better protect his family. Someday, Mr. Warsame may be in a position to explain his reasons in court.

A version of this article appears in print on October 8, 2013, on Page A9 of the New York edition with the headline: How the U.S. Is Interrogating A Qaeda Suspect. Order Reprints|Today's Paper|Subscribe